Monday, July 2, 2007

Have you ever sat down to write a post, then realized that the crap you wanted to write actually belonged in several individual posts? I always say “fuck it” and jam it all in together, so here it comes.

I don’t sleep much. The good Lord only knows why. I wish he’d tell me, because I haven’t got a clue. It’s annoying at times. Some nights I’ll get 7 hours. It’s usually much less, though. So here I am, up at 0330 after back-breaking weekend, that went something like this:

Saturday morning, up early take the pup to the woods. Every Saturday and Sunday I get up early and meet a bunch of other people who walk their dogs in the woods. We hike in to the lake, then spend an hour or so tossing balls and letting them swim and play. Maggie loves it, and it’s a great way to start the day. Then this weekend, upon returning from my walk, I attacked some much needed, back-breaking landscaping. New everything in the front yard. New lattice and trim on the wrap-around front porch, dug up the entire yard with a spade, new grass seed, made a huge mulch bed for flowers and shrubs, laid decorative edging (80 feet) yadda yadda. It took two full days, from the time I returned from walking the dog until it got too dark to see. I’m sun burned, blistered, and sore. So at 11:00 last night I could barely keep my eyes open, stumble upstairs to go to sleep thinking I’ll sleep late today, then wake up at 0330. Great. Yahoo.

Of course, while doing the yard, I spent an assload of cash. Who’d have thought yard work would be so expensive? Speaking of which, who the fuck would have thought lattice would cost 30 bucks a sheet? Sweet Baby Jesus. The Warden didn’t help matters much, though. The tire on the wheel barrow went flat, so I asked her to run out and get a bike pump while I kept working. She takes the truck, then comes home with this HUGE box in the back. Was it a big-ass bike pump? Nope. She picks up a professional size air compressor, because “it was something I needed anyway”. Damn I love that woman. So I spend the next hour setting it up and chatting with the jealous neighbors. An hour to set up, .5 seconds to fill the tire. I’m going to have to be careful with that thing. It’s dangerous.

Speaking of neighbors, mine are awesome. Like most suburbs, my house is between two streets. The people on each side and directly behind me are great people. I have a new-found respect for the couple next door, though. On Friday night the house on the back left corner of my lot had a party. They have a party every Friday and Saturday night. It’s an apartment house, full of great people who don’t speak English doing the jobs Americans don’t want to do. It’s the only house in our entire neighborhood that is multi-family. I don’t hear them or see them (except when the kids come over to pet my pup) due to the location of the house and a 2 car garage between). Apparently my neighbors do, though).

Back to my neighbors. Saturday morning I wake up, grab a cup of coffee, then go sit in the back yard until we go walk the dog. I hear loud music, look over, and see neighbor doing the same. He sees me, then gives me the “I’m sorry” smile. I look over the fence and there is his wife, SUV parked sideways in their garage driveway, the open back door right under the open windows of the multi-family. The music was as loud as can be. She got up at 0600 and commenced the payback. She had her own fan club. Most of the neighborhood gets up fairly early, and everyone who came outside gave her the “thumbs up”. I love watching people crack.

Another great thing about having a half-dozen things you want to put in one post is that by the time you get 2 or 3 out, you’ve forgotten the rest and don’t feel like writing more anyway. I suppose I’ll go for my morning run now, then have a cup of joe on the front porch so I can admire the fruit of my labor. Perhaps I’ll pop into work early as well, so I can slide out in time to work on the back yard.
Ahhh, the joy of home ownership.

I had neighbors like that…But I had 4 sick kids during one of their little parties and completely flipped out on them… they never had another party like that afterwards! The wrath of a mom with 4 sick kids, scared the hell outta my hubby so I know I scared the shit outta those kids! :o)